


Treasure Hunt

by DarkShadeless



Series: SWTOR - collection [7]
Category: Aquaman (2018), Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends: The Old Republic (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, Kinda, Meet-Cute, Theron the half-blood prince of Atlantis, lol, need i say more, self-indulgent AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-02
Updated: 2019-01-02
Packaged: 2019-10-02 22:45:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,612
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17272562
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DarkShadeless/pseuds/DarkShadeless
Summary: Vette goes looking for treasure. They end up finding something else.(Or maybe they don't.)





	Treasure Hunt

**Author's Note:**

> I couldn't resist.
> 
> Tiny glimpses of how Yon's society works ahead. Seeing as they're a very AU version of Sith, you can imagine how that will go.

 

 

They’re out of bounds.

Of course they are. How else would they get into so much trouble?

Going up this far is dangerous, as Yon’s family will be quick to remind him if they catch him at it, but what they don’t know won’t get him nagged. He _had_ to. Kind of. He can’t let his one vassal get eaten, can he now? That would be hell on his reputation, even if Vette is the single worst escape artist he has ever seen.

_Poseidon as my witness, one of these days she’ll run afoul of the Trench without me there to pull her tentacles out of the lava._

Those are the things on the forefront of his mind as Yon cleaves through the water as close to the rugged seafloor as he can, following the faint trail of disturbed sea life and pheromones Vette has left in her wake. At least his servant slash responsibility slash friend has sense enough to keep low, where she can hide in the reefs if bad comes to worse. That’s about the only defence mechanism evolution has left her people when something with teeth and claws comes calling.

Their many appendages are deceptively strong but they are too _soft_. If it weren’t for their highborn brethren the Trench would have gobbled them all up centuries ago.

And here he is, hunting her down _again_ , out of bounds. They’re both going to end up as someone’s meal.

There’s a flash of light blue, too far ahead. With a curse that’s more subharmonics than sound Yon redoubles his efforts.

_I swear by the lightless Depth I’m going to chain her to her nest. I will. This time I’ll really do it!_

Even as he thinks it, his tertiary fins cramp. Of course he wouldn’t, she’d be so _miserable_.

_Couldn’t she have taken me along? Merciful currents._

It’s not as if she has ever hatched a jellyfish-brained idea he hasn’t let himself get roped into. If Yon is completely honest the worst of them they come up with together, but today Vette really is in over her tailed head. They’re up so far the ever-present darkness of the Deep is starting to lighten. The corals flashing past him at speed are interspersed with the wrecks of surfacer-vessels.

‘ _Going on a treasure hunt’_ Vette’s note had said ‘ _be back later.’_ Yon had almost had a heart attack just reading that.

Vette’s last ‘treasure hunt’ had them swimming full tilt to stay ahead of a deep-sea moray bigger than it had any right to be with its cave coming down around their fins. He’s not too proud to admit he has sleep-terrors about the whole thing.

A stray current brushes over Yon's frills. It’s a touch colder than it should be, just a little faster. He dives without a thought.

The sponges and corals hide him well enough, despite his coloring. The boat sails past overhead without pause.

_Atlanteans? What are they doing here?_

Their shallow-dwelling cousins don’t usually brave waters this close to the Trench, not if they can at all avoid it. They only come around when they want to feed someone to the Swarm. Cowards to the last. If _they_ had sunk next to what once was the neighbouring kingdom of Dromunda they would have been chow.

Not that they aren't dangerous in their own right.

_Brine and bristles. Vette!_

Stealth isn’t conductive to _speed_ but Yon does his best. Thankfully he can squeeze through tight spaces if need be. In fits and starts he navigates the reef, one outcropping at a time.

Finally, finally, he’s closing in. The water is starting to grow sweeter with the markers her people leave behind for their brethren to follow. Since they aren’t quite the same it mostly reads as ‘prey’ to Yon. He’s sure it would sing of her curiosity and excitement if he could properly decipher it. ' _Come and look! Come!'_

His Vette could tempt their whole glide to their doom. She's damned lucky Yon is the extent of it.

If something happens to her he’ll never forgive himself.

_There you are._

There she is indeed. In front of him the sea floor dips and not five strokes down he can make out the tips of her tentacles where she’s plastered herself to a large anemone. If Yon didn’t know what he was looking for he’d think they were one.

A half-league out the Atlantean ship is speeding away, lighting up the reef beneath it as it goes. How strange.

_Whatever. Good riddance._

Yon pushes himself off the cliff and darts toward Vette, quick as he can. It’s a testament to how often they’ve done this that she doesn’t even flinch when he comes down next to her. “Watch it! They’ll see us!”

“You’re one to talk!”

“Ssh!”

The ship turns. They press themselves to into the shadow of the anemone and not a moment too soon. Yon’s hand finds Vette’s. When she returns his grip with a light squeeze his dorsal spines finally start to relax out of a threat display, despite the mess they’re in. “Damn it, Vette. My whole back is a cramp, why do you do this to me?”

“You weren’t home! And Baru said it was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity!”

“Baru’s full of shit!” He’s going to _kill_ that blabbermouth. _Kill him dead_.

“Hey! That’s my cousin you’re throwing shade on!”

“You’re cousin is _Trench fodder_ , just wait until I get back!”

A beam of light flashes over their hiding place and they fall silent, pressed as close together as they can manage. Thankfully Yon is so used to folding his ray-fins away from her he can do it in his sleep.

Vette’s tentacles curl around his ankles affectionately, though that doesn’t stop her from hissing at him. “Don’t be _mean_!”

“I’ll show you mean! I’ll tear his feelers off and shove them up his-”

“Ssssh!”

The Atlanteans pass them by once more. Cowardly and blind as a lantern fish. _Goodness me, how do they survive?_

By building tin cans to cruise around in, apparently. Yon looks after them in distaste. “What the frell is up with them?”

Instead of weighing in on that because she has an opinion on everything under the surface and above, not that she’s seen it _or will_ , _Vette, really!_ his friend tightens her grip. Oh, Yon has a bad feeling about this. There is a gleam in her eye that means nothing good.

“Come on! I’ll show you.”

 

 

‘It’ is farther into the reef than Yon would like but there’s no deterring his companion once she has set her mind on something. A few strokes past their starting point something has left a trail of destruction in the sturdy clusters of corral and stone. If that’s indeed what the Atlanteans were looking for they’re even blinder than Yon thought.

Someone has tried to cover the tracks but they’ve done a terrible job of it. He could do better before he was allowed out to hunt on his own, for Poseidon’s sake, and that’s really saying something. Those were the days Yon was still playing hide-and-seek and catch-me-if-you-can with clutchmates that could adapt their coloring to their surroundings, the damned cheaters.

Compared to that it's hardly a challenge to find the wreck of another Atlantean vessel under a few misappropriated sheets of giant kelp.

It has definitely seen better days. Naturally, Vette coos over it in delight and spends some time trying to pry shiny stuff of its hull, while Yon is left holding the bag and watching the reef with every shred of well-founded paranoia he has cultivated over the years. “Is this it?”

“What do you mean ‘is this it’? Just look at all the treasure!”

By the Deep, how did Baru even _know_ about this? _And why is it here?_

Carefully, Yon flares his fins and scents the water.

There are some things no amount of disturbance can cover. Blood is one of them. It settles on his tongue like a lure. _Oh._

His fins mantle in response to instincts that come before thought and reason. ‘ _Prey, prey, prey_ ’ is written on the currents, more clearly than Vette’s scent trail ever could. “Vette.”

“What?”

“Did you see the pilot?”

 

 

He didn’t get far, the trail ends not two leagues from the wreckage. They circle where Yon loses it and really, he’s about ready to call it a day, when Vette sees what they are looking for.

It’s an Atlantean, pink-ish skin and all. Compared to Yon’s and Vette’s people, his colouring is downright boring. Somehow he seems to have managed to tangle himself in low-growing carnivorous sea grass.

The blood must have attracted its attention. He’s a few classes too big to make a good meal for the plants, honestly. _Or so you would **think**._

They watch him flail about for a little while.

When he turns head over tail and faceplants into the floor for the second time instead of getting free, Vette bites her lip and ventures, “That one’s kind of useless, huh?”

Blankly, Yon says the first thing that comes to mind. “Yes.”

Seriously, if the guy doesn’t get a grip he’s going to have semi-animated sea plants pull one over on him. How embarrassing is that?

It’s the single most pitiful thing Yon can remember witnessing in his _life_. He should put him out of his misery and elevate the entire Atlantean species just by making sure he can’t reproduce.

The tangle of grass and limbs yelps and wriggles wildly.

Slowly, Vette floats over to his side to lean against him. “You’re going to help him, aren’t you?”

… he is, isn’t he.

_Shit._

_  
_


End file.
